Michio Watanabe
Michio Watanabe (Japanese渡 辺 美智 雄, born July 28, 1923 in the Otawara, Tochigi Prefecture, Japan, † September 15, 1995 in Tokyo ) was a Japanese politician.
Biography
MP and Minister
Watanabe began his political career as a candidate of the Liberal Democratic Party ( LDP) in 1955 with the election of the member of the Parliament of Tochigi Prefecture, where he remained until 1963. Subsequently, he was elected a deputy of the lower house ( Shūgiin ), in which the interests of the constituency he represented until his death in Tochigi for the LDP III. After it came to successes of the Japanese Communist Party in the local elections and elections to the upper house ( Sangiin ) in 1973, he demanded as representative of the " Club of the Summer Dream" ( Seirankai ) called conservative wing of the party of Prime Minister Tanaka Kakuei a return to the values of the LDP to combat the Communists.
In 1976 he was appointed by Prime Minister Fukuda Takeo as Minister of Health and Welfare for the first time in a government and this was one until 1977.
From December 1978 to November 1979 he was Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries in the cabinet of Prime Minister Ohira Masayoshi first.
Within the LDP, he belonged to the faction Seisaku Kagaku Kenkyujo at ( Seikaken ) Yasuhiro Nakasone of.
In the first and second government of Prime Minister Suzuki Zenko he took between July 1980 and November 1982, the influential Minister of Finance. In 1981, he was the founder of the cross-party group study Onchikai. 1982 there was an economic crisis with an increase in the national debt and a decline in economic activity. The envisaged to take measures to reduce the national debt, however, were not accepted.
Later he was during the second term of Prime Minister Nakasone December 1985 to July 1986 a member of a government and had the important post of Minister of International Trade and Industry held. This period also fell again an economic crisis, resulting in a depreciation of the yen.
Between October 1987 to June 1989 he was one of the party executive of the Japanese Liberal Democratic Party as chairman of the Policy Research Council and was thus in addition to the prime minister and LDP chairman Noboru Takeshita one of the so-called " three important party positions " held.
Faktionsvorsitzender and unsuccessful candidates as party chairman
In 1990 he became chairman of the Nakasone faction, which was renamed at the same time in Watanabe faction. He was known for his particularly harsh way of speaking and also criticized that he claimed that the colored Americans intemperate spendthrift were, many Chinese were still living in caves and particularly that Korea had agreed with its annexation by Japan in 1910.
As chairman of the Watanabe faction he ran several times unsuccessfully in the election for the post of chairman of the LDP and thus de facto for the Prime Minister. First, he was defeated in the 1991 election Miyazawa Kiichi with 120 to 285 votes. However, it was in its first and second cabinet from November 1991 to April 1993 Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, but ultimately had to give up for health reasons these offices.
In 1993 he was defeated again in the election for party chairman by 159 votes to 208 Kono Yohei. However, the LDP since 1955, after the first time not the Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa but by the Japan New Party. The loss of power was already anticipated by Watanabe.
In 1994 he tried before the election of the Prime Minister, the formation of an alliance with other parties, but this was due to lack of support.
A few months before his death in 1995 he was the Head of Delegation for the normalization of diplomatic relations with North Korea as well as for further talks that led to the commitment of an auxiliary supply of 300,000 tons of rice to North Korea.
His son, Yoshimi Watanabe, who was his private secretary since 1983, was elected in 1996 as his successor for the Members of the House.